


Aftermath

by Nemainofthewater



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Don't copy to another site, F/M, Fix-It, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, Introspection, M/M, post 4x13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-19
Updated: 2019-04-19
Packaged: 2020-01-16 08:09:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18517393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemainofthewater/pseuds/Nemainofthewater
Summary: Eliot and Alice in the aftermath.Fix-it.





	Aftermath

“It’s my fault,” Alice says.

 

She’s sat on her bed in the Cottage. What used to be her bed. What might still be her bed: the amounts of Physical kids this year has dropped what with most of the first years plummeting to their deaths on the way to the South Pole.

 

She never thought that she’d be back here. Not sat in her stupidly well-preserved room, on a bed that still smells like Quentin.

 

Oh God. Quentin.

 

Alice closes her eyes, and takes a deep breathe, and pretends. Pretends that time has wound back and it’s the morning again when they were all scared and helpless but… they were also still together. The had a plan.

 

“It’s not your fault.”

 

Alice opens her eyes with a start. Because it’s Eliot’s voice, and he’s the last person she thought would come to see her. He’s standing in the doorway, and he looks… he looks like crap. Even taking into account the fact that he’s still recovering from surgery. But she doesn’t have any room to talk. Alice knows that her hair is lank and greasy, and she can still smell the smoke, every time she moves.

 

(She doesn’t want to take a shower. It’s stupid but it feels like washing the last bit of Quentin away. It feels like giving up.)

 

Eliot makes his slow, painful way into the room, awkwardly manoeuvring his cane. He drops onto the bed next to her heavily. He doesn’t make a sound, but Alice can see the sheen of sweat on his forehead. And…in his eyes. God. She can see herself in his eyes, the hurt and pain and sheer loss.

 

She and Eliot have never been friends. Any potential friendship they could have had was quashed years ago, after her first relationship with Quentin ends with Eliot’s dick in his mouth.

 

No. They were never friends. Allies maybe. But not friends.

 

Now though? Now he’s the only one who can possibly understand.

 

“Don’t blame yourself. Blame Everett, blame the Monsters, blame the Library, blame the whole shitty world that led to this. Blame me! Because I hurt him, I pushed him away and broke the heart of someone who was good and true and loving and kind and made him believe that he had to push away love and sacrifice himself for the greater good. But for fuck’s sake, don’t blame yourself. Because I can’t lose anyone else. Not now.”

 

“You don’t even like me,” Alice whispers.

 

Eliot sighs.

 

“Does it matter at this point?” he asks.

 

Alice swallows.

 

“I suppose not,” she says quietly.

 

Eliot smiles at her. It’s painful. It’s like someone stuck a band-aid over a gaping wound and called it fixed.

 

“Now,” he says, “I need you to come downstairs with me. We can’t have our war council without you.”

 

“War council?” Alice asks. The Library has been dismantled, the Monsters are trapped in the Seam, Everett is dead. Unless she’s missing something, there’s no one left to go to war against.

 

“War council,” Eliot confirms, “After all we’ve a former niffen and one of the smartest magicians I know, the leader of the hedgewitches who has an in with an Underworld employee, a Traveller, and a non-evil head librarian on our side. Not to mention, two ex-Monster hosts who happen to have a little extra magic left over from their parasites.”

 

Eliot twists his hand and a flame appears, bright and powerful, and so much stronger than anyone should have been able to conjure with the level of ambient magic still so low.

 

“Are you saying…?” Alice asks.

 

“Yes. We’re staging a jail break.”

**Author's Note:**

> I am on Tumblr as [Nemainofthewater ](https://nemainofthewater.tumblr.com)


End file.
